The Backcheck: Lightning defeat the Hurricanes in shutout win

The Tampa Bay Lightning got back in the win column Tuesday night and collected points for the fourth-straight game in a 3-0 win over the Carolina Hurricanes. The Bolts got goals from Brayden Point, Alex Barre-Boulet and Nick Paul with Jonas Johansson recording his second career shutout and first as a member of the Lightning, stopping all 32 shots he faced.

With Martin Necas in the penalty box for high-sticking Darren Raddysh, the Bolts opened the scoring with a power-play goal from Point with 54 seconds left in the first period. Taking a pass from Nikita Kucherov at the point, Victor Hedman quickly fired a one-timer toward the net, where a wide-open Point was waiting to redirect the shot past Pyotr Kochetkov for his first goal of the season.

With the score still at 1-0, Tampa Bay got another goal late in a period with Barre-Boulet lighting the lamp for a second-consecutive game to double the lead with 2:09 left in the middle frame. After Point found Barre-Boulet with a pass across the offensive zone, the shifty winger tried to make a move to the forehand before sending the puck up to the point for Raddysh. With his head up the whole way, Raddysh hammered a shot pass to the back door, where Barre-Boulet had slipped out and found himself all alone to redirect the puck past Kochetkov and make it 2-0.

Similar to Saturday’s contest against the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Lightning went into the third period with a two-goal lead at home and a chance to earn an important two points. Looking to play a full 60-minute game Tuesday night, Tampa Bay shut the door on Carolina in the third period and added a back-breaking goal with 2:56 remaining with Brandon Hagel finding Paul at the left faceoff dot before the power forward ripped a quick one-timer past Kochetkov to make it 3-0.

With the win, the Bolts moved to 3-2-2 on the season with a home record of 3-0-1.

Bolts Quotes

Jon Cooper: "We played a pretty complete game and I don't think we gave them anything all night. It's funny about this game, somebody will look down and say, 'Oh wow, Carolina had 33 shots.' But I thought we kept everything to the outside, goalie got to see everything and if there was a hair-raising moment for a second, he was calm in the net for us. I thought it was a pretty workmanlike game for the guys. We got the lead, extended it and held it. That's what you want to do in this league. And they did it for 60 minutes."

Jon Cooper: "When you don't give up a goal in a game, it's more than just the goalie. He'd probably be the first to tell you, it was a team shutout. I don't want to say he played better, but he was really, really good against Toronto. Tonight, he just had to sit there and let the pucks hit him. We caught Carolina at the end of quite a long road trip. You have to try to take advantage of teams that have traveled and been tired, so it was fortunate for us and we took advantage."

Brayden Point: "Less sitting back. Still trying to press and play our game and stay on top of them. I think, in the Toronto game, we just kind of sat back and gave them too much time to make plays. I thought tonight we did a good job of just continuing to play and press them. It's just a little confidence that we can do it. We can close out a game. We can defend. Obviously, JJ getting a shutout, but I think we did a better job tonight of limiting chances than we have in the past games."

Jonas Johansson on if some wins feel nicer than others: "Yeah, they do. I want to say those tight wins when you really need to get one, those feel the best. But two points is two points, always."

Bolts by the Numbers

• Victor Hedman recorded his sixth assist of the season, tied for the second-most among all NHL defensemen, while his seven points are tied for the fourth-most.
• Brayden Point scored his 42^nd career game-opening goal, the sixth-most among all NHL skaters since he entered the NHL in 2016-17.
• Nikita Kucherov picked up one assist and now has 10 points this season, tied for the sixth-most among all NHL skaters.
• Jonas Johansson has now made 198 saves this season, the most among all NHL goaltenders and 37 more than the next-closest goalie.
• Johansson’s .917 save percentage ranks ninth among all NHL goalies with four or more games played this season.
• Anthony Cirelli won 10-of-19 faceoffs and has won 60.4% of his faceoffs this season, the fourth-highest win percentage among all NHL skaters with 100 draws or more this season.
• The Lightning went 1-for-4 on the power play and have converted on 33.3% of their power plays this season, the fifth-best percentage among all NHL teams.
• The Bolts went 4-for-4 on the penalty kill and moved to 94.1% on the PK this season, the third-highest percentage among all NHL teams. They have not allowed a power-play goal against since the first game of the season vs. Nashville.

Krenner’s Three Stars

1. Jonas Johansson
2. Brayden Point
3. Alex Barre-Boulet

Lightning Look Ahead

Thursday, October 26 vs. San Jose Sharks, 7 p.m. ET, AMALIE Arena

Monday, October 30 vs. Seattle Kraken, 7 p.m. ET, AMALIE Arena

Thursday, November 2 at Columbus Blue Jackets, 7 p.m. ET, Nationwide Arena